ALTANA AG and UB FIGG invest in the Finnish tech­no­logy com­pany NORDTREAT

Wesel / Hel­sinki / Vantaa, June 20, 2024 – The Finnish sus­tain­ab­il­ity fund UB Forest Industry Green Growth Fund (UB FIGG) and the spe­cialty chem­ic­als group ALTANA are invest­ing in the tech­no­logy com­pany NORDTREAT. The com­pany spe­cial­izes in the devel­op­ment and pro­duc­tion of innov­at­ive, high-per­form­ance, and envir­on­ment­ally friendly flame retard­ants. NORDTREAT relies on bio-based raw mater­i­als, and its products com­ply with the latest fire pro­tec­tion reg­u­la­tions. The company’s NOR­FLAM® products are already being used suc­cess­fully to pro­tect more than 2,000 build­ings and struc­tures around the world.

NORDTREAT was estab­lished in 2015. Since then, the com­pany has expan­ded its product and ser­vice port­fo­lio for bio-based, envir­on­ment­ally friendly flame retard­ants. In addi­tion to the invest­ment by UB FIGG and ALTANA AG, the com­pany has also agreed with ALTANA’s BYK divi­sion to devel­op bio-based flame retard­ant addit­ives. ​“With its cer­ti­fied fire retard­ants and flame retard­ant sys­tems, NORDTREAT has already developed envir­on­ment­ally friendly products and suc­cess­fully launched them on the mar­ket. At the same time, we are see­ing a grow­ing demand for bio-based solu­tions for flame retard­ant addit­ives. Build­ing on this, we are pool­ing our innov­at­ive strength to jointly devel­op nov­el, bio-based addit­ives for fire pro­tec­tion,” says BYK Divi­sion Pres­id­ent Dr. Jörg Hinnerwisch.

Sakari Saarela, a part­ner at UB FIGG com­ments: ​“NORDTREAT is an excit­ing com­pany with excel­lent products, repla­cing leg­acy fire retard­ancy products with a new, innov­at­ive bio-based altern­at­ive. We are very happy to sup­port NORDTREAT’s growth, serving espe­cially the wood-based con­struc­tion industry in Europe and glob­ally. We value our part­ner­ship with ALTANA in the invest­ment due to their expert­ise and resources in the spe­cialty chem­ic­als sec­tor, and we are look­ing for­ward to the cooperation.”

“In ALTANA and UB FIGG, we have gained two strong part­ners for our sus­tain­able busi­ness mod­el who will help us to fully exploit the growth poten­tial of our tech­no­logy,” says Aki Bor­gentorp, CEO of NORDTREAT. ​“With ALTANA’s BYK divi­sion, we also have an innov­at­ive part­ner with whom we can jointly drive the trans­form­a­tion towards more envir­on­ment­ally friendly product solutions.”

The parties have agreed not to dis­close the invest­ment amount.

About ALTANA:

ALTANA is a glob­al lead­er in true spe­cialty chem­ic­als. The Group offers innov­at­ive, envir­on­ment­ally com­pat­ible solu­tions for coat­ing man­u­fac­tur­ers, paint and plastics pro­cessors, the print­ing and pack­aging indus­tries, the cos­met­ics sec­tor, and the elec­tric­al and elec­tron­ics industry. The product range includes addit­ives, spe­cialty coat­ings and adhes­ives, effect pig­ments, seal­ants and com­pounds, impreg­nat­ing res­ins and var­nishes, and test­ing and meas­ur­ing instru­ments. ALTANA’s four divi­sions, BYK, ECK­ART, ELANTAS, and ACTEGA, all occupy a lead­ing pos­i­tion in their tar­get mar­kets with respect to qual­ity, product solu­tion expert­ise, innov­a­tion, and service.

Headquartered in Wesel, Ger­many, the ALTANA Group has 64 pro­duc­tion facil­it­ies and 68 ser­vice and research labor­at­or­ies world­wide. Through­out the Group, around 8,000 people work to ensure the world­wide suc­cess of ALTANA. In 2023, ALTANA achieved sales of more than € 2.7 bil­lion. About 7 per­cent of the total sales is inves­ted in research and devel­op­ment each year. Its high earn­ing power and high growth rate make ALTANA one of the world’s most innov­at­ive, fast­est grow­ing, and most prof­it­able chem­ic­al companies.

www​.altana​.com

About BYK:

BYK is a lead­ing glob­al sup­pli­er of spe­cialty chem­ic­als. The company’s innov­at­ive addit­ives and dif­fer­en­ti­ated solu­tions optim­ize product and mater­i­al prop­er­ties as well as pro­duc­tion and applic­a­tion pro­cesses. Amongst oth­er things, BYK addit­ives improve scratch res­ist­ance and sur­face gloss, the mech­an­ic­al strength or flow beha­vi­or of mater­i­als, and prop­er­ties such as UV- and light sta­bil­ity or flame retard­ancy. In the field of qual­ity assur­ance, BYK’s meas­ur­ing and test­ing instru­ments serve to effect­ively assess appear­ance and phys­ic­al properties.

The company’s cus­tom­ers include man­u­fac­tur­ers of coat­ings and print­ing inks, plastics, adhes­ives and seal­ants, as well as clean­ers, floor coat­ings, and lub­ric­ants. BYK addit­ives are also suc­cess­fully used in the con­struc­tion chem­istry, oil and gas, and foundry industries.

BYK has a glob­al net­work of sub­si­di­ar­ies and oper­ates pro­duc­tion sites in Ger­many (Wesel, Kem­pen, Moos­burg, Sch­ko­pau, Ger­ets­ried), the Neth­er­lands (Deventer, Denekamp, Nijver­dal), and the UK (Widnes), in the USA (Walling­ford, Chester, Columbia, Earth City, Gonzales, Louis­ville, Pitt­s­ford), and in China (Shang­hai, Tongling).

The com­pany is part of the ALTANA Group and employs a work­force of more than 2,500 people worldwide.

www​.byk​.de

About UB FIGG:

UB FIGG is a private equity fund invest­ing in com­pan­ies focused on plastic and oth­er fossil based mater­i­al replace­ments, high­er value and more effi­cient use of wood and agri­cul­tur­al raw mater­i­al side streams and great­er use of these raw mater­i­als across a wide range of inter­me­di­ate and end uses. Through its invest­ments, the Fund helps the forest and bio-based indus­tries to cre­ate solu­tions to mit­ig­ate cli­mate change. UB FIGG is a sig­nat­ory of Oper­at­ing Prin­ciples for Impact Man­age­ment and reports on the envir­on­ment­al and cli­mate impact of its invest­ments. UB FIGG star­ted its oper­a­tions in Janu­ary 2023 with over EUR 100 mil­lion in invest­ment com­mit­ments. UB FIGG cur­rently accepts fur­ther invest­ments from pro­fes­sion­al investors.

www​.ubfigg​.com

About NORDTREAT:

NORDTREAT is a Finnish tech­no­logy com­pany foun­ded in 2015, spe­cial­iz­ing in the devel­op­ment and pro­duc­tion of envir­on­ment­ally friendly, high-per­form­ance flame retard­ants. Util­iz­ing bio-based raw mater­i­als, NORDTREAT’s products com­ply with the latest fire pro­tec­tion reg­u­la­tions and have been used to pro­tect over 2,000 build­ings world­wide. The com­pany’s flag­ship tech­no­logy, NOR­FLAM®, is designed to provide super­i­or fire pro­tec­tion while main­tain­ing envir­on­ment­al sus­tain­ab­il­ity. NORDTREAT’s innov­at­ive solu­tions are aimed at meet­ing the grow­ing glob­al demand for safer, more sus­tain­able con­struc­tion materials.

https://​www​.nordtreat​.com/en/